


autumn leaves and apple cider

by ArdenSkyeHolmes221



Series: 13 nights of halloween [2]
Category: Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Family Feels, Fluff, Gen, I REGRET NOTHING, Peter Parker is Tony Stark's Biological Child, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony Stark Lives, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, hayrides, pumpkin patches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-09
Updated: 2019-10-09
Packaged: 2020-11-28 12:34:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20966648
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArdenSkyeHolmes221/pseuds/ArdenSkyeHolmes221
Summary: “Morgan Hope, what are you doing out of your seat?” comes their father’s terse question as the man twists from the passenger seat to stare back at them. “Peter isn’t your lounge chair. Get back over there, little miss.”Morgan’s head tips back onto Peter’s chest. “But Daaaaad,” she whines, “Pete needs to braid my hair.”“I don’t care. He can do it when we get there.”“He’ll do it fast, I promise, ‘cuz I don’t wanna wait.”“Oh, is that so?”***Or, the Starks and autumn and going to a pumpkin farm.





	autumn leaves and apple cider

Peter yawns. His fists rub his eyes hard enough to see black stars. Eventually he blinks hard enough that he can see the time projected on his ceiling: 7:33. He grunts. Mental math tells him he’s slept a little over two hours since last time he checked the time. He shoves off his comforter, whines at the blast of cold, and rolls out of bed.

He pads into the hallway in search of his father.

Kitchen is empty. Couch in the family room is unoccupied. His brow furrows as Peter shuffles toward the back porch. Now, if his dad can’t be found inside the house, Peter can always find him somewhere outside. It has been a weird transition not automatically finding Tony Stark inside a laboratory, but time is on Peter’s side now.

Only the back porch is vacant and worry settles heavily in Peter’s stomach.

“Front porch?” he asks himself under his breath as he cuts through the cabin. If anxiety wasn’t pressing right at his edges, Peter could have stretched out his hearing and listened for his father’s heartbeat; however, as he is preoccupied, Peter walks out onto the front porch to the sight of thick fog cloaking the earth and no sign of his father.

He isn’t sure what compels him onward: Peter tromps down the steps and his socks immediately soak up grass’s moisture as he ambles toward the dock. A violent shiver traverses his spinal column so Peter tucks his fingers underneath his armpits.

Fog density is high, causing Peter to rely on muscle memory. Gentle waves lapping guides him along as well. He squints as if his advanced eyesight could cut through fall’s veil: it can’t. Leaves crunch beneath his feet. His toes keep finding holes or rocks to trip over. Perhaps in the end his advanced eyesight does assist him because up ahead his sees a figure at the end of the dock, barely even a silhouette, though it’s enough to tip Peter off that he found his father.

“Dad?”

Figure turns and a familiar baritone croaks out, “Pete?”

Relieved to have found his father, Peter closes the distance between him and the figure at the end of the dock as quickly as he dares. A hand grasps at Peter’s forearm and curls into his hoodie material.

“What are you doing out here?” he asks, not bothering to hide his confusion.

“No reason,” is the first reply then his father sighs a laugh and finishes, “dunno, really, other than I just wanted to be by the water.”

Peter shrugs off the answer.

Father and son stand side by side, listening to the lake lap and birds tweet good morning hellos, until another chill steels over Peter. Then he burrows into his father’s side, maneuvering his arms around him until Peter is satisfied. He hums.

“Cold?”

He makes a noise at the back of his throat, too lazy to verbalize.

“What, my hoodie not cutting it for you anymore?” his dad keeps pressing, a hint of his amusement breaking into his tone. “I speak from experience when I say I know that hoodie is warm.”

“S’not yours, s’mine,” he muffles his words into his father’s side. “And my toes are cold.”

“Your toes are—” Tony cuts off and then exclaims, “Why the _hell _are you outside without your shoes? Get back inside!” he gives Peter a little push.

Peter giggles, stumbling but not moving away. He may have stuck himself to his father’s side using his spidery stickiness.

Then his dad’s fingers wiggle like he’s going to tickle Peter and he _shrieks, _unsticks himself and bolts for the cabin. His father’s deep chuckles follow behind him at a sedated pace. He has no time to feel embarrassment for the ploy because Peter loathes being tickled, especially thanks to his enhanced sensitivity after the spider bite. Any time his dad or sister do not get their way, they have the tendency to exploit Peter’s weakness.

_Not fair, _he pouts as he opens the glass screen door. His smile won’t disappear, though.

Peter trots back into his bedroom to shower. It is only a matter of time before the calm of the morning is broken by Morgan waking up. Last night Dad and Pepper promised the whole family would go pumpkin picking and Peter’s little sister lost her mind. When he first came back, snapped or blipped or whatever terminology is popular at the moment, Morgan’s exuberance was a bit much for Peter’s frayed nervous system. She weaseled her way into his heart, though. Eventually.

He shakes the thoughts away and finishes getting ready.

Dad and Pepper are making breakfast when Peter wanders back into the kitchen.

“Pete!” his sister chirps, sporting a chocolate milk mustache.“Come eat; we have places to be!”

Peter snorts as he finishes shuffling to his seat next to the young girl. “I didn’t realize we were leaving so early?”

“We’re not,” his father snorts.

Peter looks up to see his stepmother rolling her eyes and Peter smirks at her, both of them sharing a knowing expression.

Morgan decides pestering is the way to go after finding out that they aren’t leaving until after lunch. All it does is keep her chattering and everyone else wishing away the morning. And she convinces Pepper they should have a picnic in the car so they can get to the pumpkin patch earlier.

Halfway to their destination, Morgan turns to Peter and says,

“Will you braid my hair?”

“Now?”

“Mmhmm!”

Before Peter can positively or negatively reply, Morgan is already climbing out of her booster seat and crawling into his lap. Peter fumbles to assist her but she knocks away his hands until she settles herself. Her smile is pleased and she is definitely preening.

“Mo—” he starts.

“Morgan Hope, what are you doing out of your seat?” comes their father’s terse question as the man twists from the passenger seat to stare back at them. “Peter isn’t your lounge chair. Get back over there, little miss.”

Morgan’s head tips back onto Peter’s chest. “But Daaaaad,” she whines, “Pete needs to braid my hair.”

“I don’t care. He can do it when we get there.”

“He’ll do it fast, I _promise_, ‘cuz I don’t wanna wait.”

“Oh, is that so?”

Morgan turns away from their father and pokes Peter in the cheek. “Please, Petey, will you braid my hair?”

Peter’s gaze flits to Tony. His father acts unimpressed but his eyes twinkle in amusement. So he answers, “Sure. Do you have a band?”

Morgan slips two different colored purple cloth bands off her wrists and shoves them in his face. (He thinks that’s what they’re called; Morgan calls them ponytail holders, sometimes, and Pepper goes back and forth between ponytail holders and bands. He’s settled on bands to be done with it.)

He makes a face at her and turns her to sit forward. “The things I do for you,” he pretends to grumble.

“The things I do for the both of you,” his father echoes from up front, correcting his posture.

“I know.” his sister sing-songs. “It’s ‘cuz you love me!”

Because Morgan is queen-in-training when it comes to avoidance strategies, Peter is suckered into giving her twin braids. Then she wraps her arms around his neck and makes him strap her back into her booster seat. She kisses his cheek in thanks, though, so there are small consolation prizes.

Forty minutes after leaving their lake house, they arrive at their destination. Morgan cheers and their parents share a smile upfront. On top of handling random hair crises in the middle of road trips, Peter’s job also entails making sure Morgan keeps her socks on and putting on a jacket. Both are rather monumental tasks considering Peter has enhanced strength and Morgan is barely pushing three-three in height; his sister is wily. However, seeing as how his sister hasn’t pestered with her yellow rain boots this entire time that leaves,

“Jacket, Mo,” he hands over the pink lightweight jacket.

“Don’t need it,” she scrunches up her nose and eyes the item with growing distain. “I’ve got my Iron Man sweater on; don’t need a jacket.” to prove her point, her hands disappear in the golden material of her sleeves and she shakes them in his direction with all the fanfare of an ornery five year old, “Seeeeeeee?”

“I’m not the boss.”

“You’re ‘posed to be one of my bosses, so technically you are the boss.”

“Too bad I’m always the boss and trump your brother then, hmm, little miss?” Tony interjects as he turns around in his seat, free of the safety belt’s restriction, snagging the jacket from Peter’s outstretched clutches and shaking it in his daughter’s direction. “No jacket means no hayride.”

Despite herself, Morgan can’t think up a quick enough rebuttal. She rolls her shoulders back and lets out a dramatic huff of, “Fine.” Then yanks the material and carelessly shrugs into it.

Pepper gets out of her seat and opens up Morgan’s door, opening up her arms in silent initiation to be held.

Tony and Peter follow them out of the car.

As they make their way into the bustling crowd, Morgan wiggles down from Pepper’s hip and spider-monkeys her way onto Peter’s back. She mostly attempts to hitch her free ride while Peter continues walking, screeching whenever he tries stopping to assist. Eventually, they somewhat compromise by Peter stopping and Morgan throwing herself onto his back, arms curled so tight around his neck Peter can almost accuse her of choking him.She nestles in close then whispers,

“Can we get some apple cider?”

“Um,” he glances around in search of the requested beverage, curious to see where she spotted it before him. Right as he finds it, one of her fingers points and he says, “Sure, if Dad and Mom don’t care.”

“Don’t care about what?” comes twin responses.

“Morgan wants apple cider.”

Pepper makes a face while Tony shrugs.

“You already had chocolate milk today, lovebug.”

Morgan scoffs into Peter’s neck.

“One cup won’t hurt her,” Tony offers up. Then he semi-lowers his voice, “Bet you she won’t even like it.”

Pepper rolls her eyes, though allows, _“One _cup.”

So they wind up waiting in line to all grab hot apple cider. Several minutes pass of Morgan clinging to Peter and Pepper fussing and Peter slowly edging closer to his father so Tony can keep making a grab for Morgan with his prosthetic arm only for the little girl to shriek. After they pay for their drinks, Pepper says they have to sit down to drink them. 

“But Moooom,” the little girl whines, eyes riveted on a tractor pulling a group of people sat in hay up the way, “I wanna go now.”

“Guess we’ll have to wait for the next one.”

Peter senses an impending meltdown. He blurts out, “Hey, Mo, watch this.” without giving much thought to his harebrained idea because his sister’s attention immediately redirects to him.

And so Peter takes a huge gulp of hot apple cider, holds his cup out at arm’s length, and spits the drink out in an arc straight back into the cup. Mostly. Only,

“Ow ow ow, crap! That is _hot!”_

Pepper looks like she wants to reprimand him, but Morgan and Tony are too busy belly laughing at Peter’s folly, so his stepmother winds up grinning along.

A different kind of warmth fills up his belly than the one lingering in his mouth.

Sure enough, when the next hayride pulls around, the Starks get on it. Morgan remains glued to Peter’s side and demands to sit in his lap during the ride. Peter nods his agreement and picks a corner seat in the back, nestled in by hay. Dad presses in on Peter’s free side while Pepper takes the last seat.

Excitement fills his bloodstream. As they take off for pumpkin pastures, Peter’s knees jostle Morgan around as his sister oohs and ahhs over the farm’s decorations. He doesn’t remember going on hayrides as a kid, though celebrating Christmas on a Malibu beach definitely makes up for it, in Peter’s humble opinion, he is embracing the experience. Like listening to Morgan sprouting out ideas of what they are going to carve their pumpkins when they get home, after spotting the first small lines of the orange spheres.

“I think I want Lord Voldemort’s face.”

His dad snorts while Peter turns Morgan around to face him.

“Why?”

“Why not?” she gives back.

“Why not a cat?”

“Because I don’t wanna paint it black; I wanna carve it!”

Pepper tacks on, “You’re not handling anything sharp, I’m afraid.” though she doesn’t sound sorry in the slightest.

Morgan knocks her forehead into Peter’s clavicle at the devastating news. Peter thinks he hears her say _this is why _under her breath but he can’t be certain.

Dad leans over to press a kiss against Peter’s temple and attempts to do the same to Morgan, but she’s having none of it. After a few more attempts, Peter hands her over all the same so Dad can drop kisses all over her rosy cheeks. Her giggles pitch over top the roar of the tractor.

Pepper winds up pretending to save Morgan right as the tractor pulls to a stop. She stands up and shuffles off with Morgan, who continuously peeks over Mom’s shoulder to cross her eyes and stick her tongue out at Dad. Peter lists into his father’s side and Tony slings in arm over his shoulders, pulling him in close.

Leaves crunch under their feet as they step off.

“Daddy has to have the biggest one,” Peter hears his sister say somewhere up ahead. “Just ‘cuz. But I don’t get the smallest one, okay, Mommy?”

“Mmm. Sounds reasonable. I suppose I’ll take the smallest one, how’s that sound?” is Pepper’s reply and Peter can imagine her smile pulling out her dimples.

“C’mon, Daddy! C’mon, Pete!” hollers Morgan. “Let’s go pick our pumpkins!”

“You heard Miss Bossypants; chop chop, daylight’s wasting away,” nudges his father.

Peter breathes in deeply and beams up at his father, his vision squinting as joy settles around them.

Autumn tastes like crisp air and hot apple cider; autumn is the warmth of his little sister wanting to show him everything that captures her attention; it’s watching his dad’s recovery in a positive light, seeing him walking around unassisted and smiling freely.

Autumn is being with his family.

**Author's Note:**

> I needed the floof. squawk with me below? <3


End file.
